


Moving Past the Feeling (It's Starting to Show Remix)

by izzyb



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Mirror Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-21
Updated: 2010-08-21
Packaged: 2017-10-11 04:41:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/108520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/izzyb/pseuds/izzyb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>McCoy never mentioned it, but she'd seen the dark cast fall over his face when he realized just how close they were getting, how often they saw each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Moving Past the Feeling (It's Starting to Show Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [VegaOfTheLyre](https://archiveofourown.org/users/VegaOfTheLyre/gifts).



> Remix of vega_ofthe_lyre's [It's Starting to Show](http://vega-writes.livejournal.com/11609.html) for [issenterprise](http://community.livejournal.com/issenterprise)'s remix challenge. Thanks to fringedweller and sleepygoof8784 for the read-through. Title from Arcade Fire (but of course).

Christine had been warned, she knew, but she had decided to ignore the people telling her to be cautious of her newly assigned roommate.

"Susan Li? She's fucking nuts," one guy said in a strangely admiring tone, seeing the name at the top of her paper from his stance above her head. Others just gave her a pitying look in the enrollment line and turned back to their own problems.

"She's going to be in the same boat as me, right? Can't be that bad," she responded glibly to the guy—also an incoming freshman—who looked much more nervous that she (which made her feel a hell of a lot better).

Not exactly, she found out. Because although Susan Li was also in her first year, she'd spent the summer before classes started sucking up to upperclassmen, both literally and figuratively, and thus had an air of entitlement about her that Christine had to be admit was well-earned.   
Susan also managed to score the prime class times—in the afternoon—the better with which to while the evenings away with…whatever she did in her free time.

Christine decided not to ask for details. She didn't want to know, although she could guess from the limp way Susan collapsed onto her bed at two in the morning when Christine was still awake studying alien anatomy. Added to this evidence were the red marks, sometimes thin red lines, on her upper arms and down her back that Christine surreptitiously observed (in a clinical way, of course, avoiding looking too closely at the swell of near-perfect breasts spilling out of her tight nightgown) when she woke up for the day and dressed in the early-morning light of their room.

But they had an uneasy truce because Susan respected Christine's gumption in throwing her shit down the first day and proceeding to bitch about the resident assistant—also known as the jackass on a power trip—who'd tried to feel her up and had the pleasure of her knee to his balls.

After nodding along with her rampage and sharing her own stories about him, Susan said, "You've got something, Chapel. I think I'll keep you."

Keep her? Was she some sort of pet? "Um. Thanks."

"Just stay out of my way and don't ever, _ever_ wake me up unless I specifically tell you to."

And it worked for both of them. Until it didn't. In Christine's defense, that morning was the one where she was completely wiped. So tired that a direct application of stimulants into her system via her contraband stock of hyposprays wouldn't have been able to make her wake up before her alarm went off. So, yeah, she'd hit the snooze button when it buzzed and rolled back over.

Susan, wearing black lingerie and a frown, had a knife to her throat when her alarm sounded again, eyes glittering dangerously in the dim light of their room. That was new.

"Turn. It. Off."

Christine complied, willing her hands not to shake. "S-sorry," she managed.

Susan nodded and stalked back to her bed, sliding the knife back under her pillow. Christine dressed quicker than she ever had before and got the hell out of there before Susan's breathing evened out into sleep.

*

It was the start of a trend—Christine waking earlier and earlier to find somewhere to spend the morning hours studying before heading into the clinic to gain some credit doing the menial (read: dangerous and soul-sucking) tasks assigned to medical interns.

The place she found was isolated, just the way she liked it—a large table tucked into a dark corner of the library no sane person dared to tread because it was within spitting distance of the command track's practice simulators. No person with any sense of self-preservation would want to be in a place they'd likely meet up with the crueler cadets of Starfleet. There seemed to be some required class command cadets go through in which they lose the remaining facets of their empathy, whereas only a special few of the medical track cadets (hey, like her) gathered up the stray pieces of said empathy and swallowed it to make themselves more vulnerable to attack, like a counter-balance or some such shit.

She didn't mind the table's location, not because she loved living on the edge. No, she had a deal with Marcus, the guy in charge of the sims, that she be left alone (something to do with the major sickness he'd faked to avoid meeting Captain Pike and that she'd caught, but not let on that it wasn't real).

So it was surprising that one day her solitude was interrupted by a cadet with rather broad shoulders collapsing into one of the chair across from hers and breathing heavily.

"Oh good, someone _sane_," he said and threw a leather bag onto the table between them and drew out a PADD. "Don't give me that look—I just mean you're not one of those fucking command types. I just escaped the most annoying, demanding, lethal—"

She kept her eyebrow raised and interrupted wryly with, "Aren't they all like that?" He didn't like being interrupted, she noticed. Maybe he wasn't used to it.

"Yes," he agreed. "This one just more than most." He shuddered and started tapping on his PADD, working for a good five minutes before looking up again. "You're in medical, right? I saw you at the clinic."

Tearing her eyes away from the map of Empire-controlled planets on her PADD, she looked up and nodded, then turned back to her studying. Her exam was in less than an hour and she was freaking out a little. He didn't seem to mind her silence, though, and they studied at the table in peace until Christine stood up, gathering her things in a panicked rush because she hadn't been watching the time. She ran out before she learned his name.

*

He was already there when she showed up two few mornings later, coffee steaming in her hand and dark circles under her eyes. He didn't look much better, head held up by one hand that slipped when she slid into the chair next to him.

"Rough night?" she asked.

"The worst. Jim brought home a girl and pushed me out of the room to sleep in the hallway—which in layman terms means you sit slumped against the wall with one eye open and a weapon in your hand so that no one messes with you."

She took a sip of her coffee then took pity on the longing look he gave it and pushed it over. "Here. I think you need this more than me."

"You, mystery girl, are a goddess. Anyone ever mention that?"

"You're the first." She paused, considering, then resolved said, "And it's Christine. Christine Chapel."

His eyes widened comically and he pushed the coffee back towards her. "The Christine Chapel who's rooming with Susan Li? Woman, you're worse off than me—you need this."

Shaking her head, she took a sip, then handed it to him. "Tell you what. We'll share the caffeine and trade roommate survival stories. Did you know that Susan once held a knife to my throat?"

"I can top that. Kirk tried to strangle me the night after we met. We were sharing a room before heading to the academy and I made the mistake of getting too close to him when he was having a goddamn night terror and he put me in a headlock and very nearly choked the air out of me before he woke up. And that was just the first time. It really didn't get any better." He drank some more coffee and gave it back to her, clearing his throat. "Oh, and sorry—I'm McCoy, by the way. Leonard McCoy."

"Nice to meet you, Leonard McCoy." They shook hands and Christine tried to remember where she'd heard the name Jim Kirk. She figured Susan would know, if she had cooled down from the alarm clock incident. Feeling brave after meeting another person with a roommate who took the recruiting slogan a little too seriously (_Whatever it Takes To Be the Best_), Christine decided to ask her when she got home from the clinic.

*

Christine tried not to make too many habits at the academy because those who openly disliked her (whose number had surprisingly dwindled since she started hanging out with, scratch that, _studying_ at the library with McCoy) tended to use schedules and routines to their advantage. Christine couldn't help herself with this, though, and she met him there every day, barring emergencies, coffee, if it was her turn, and horror stories in tow. They sat closer and closer each time, studying together once they realized that they shared a few large lecture classes.

It wasn't a routine, really, more like a necessity. As with many good things, even the necessary ones, it went to hell sooner rather than later.

And it was all Jim Kirk's fault—it hadn't taken long to find out who _he_ was. Son of an idiot, that's what they called him, though never, ever to his face. His father was a man who'd died trying to catch one crazyass Romulan while his mother screamed for him to _get his ass out of there_ from one of the escaping shuttles. He hadn't succeeded—the ship had disappeared and George Kirk along with it and Jim Kirk was left to live up to the reputation of a man who'd effectively committed suicide using a ship more valuable than all the lives he saved put together. The fallout from this led the son to overly compensate for it by following rules to a T—at least outwardly—but staying as far from Starfleet as possible. Which, ironically, made them want him all the more. Then one day he abruptly changed his mind and enrolled at the academy. Rumor was that his mother, and possibly her illicit relationship with Christopher Pike had something to do with it.

That's all Susan knew, anyway, but Kirk had to know about Christine and tolerate her just as much as Susan did because she wasn't dead yet.

The other rumor floating around said that a lot of people Jim didn't like ended up dead, not that anyone could prove it. Rule follower, remember? Well, at least outwardly.

She was safe, for now. McCoy never mentioned it, but she'd seen the dark cast fall over his face when he realized just how close they were getting, how often they saw each other. They'd never done anything worse than brush hands, but there was still that link there now. It was one of those that said that they knew more about each other than they should; that they'd let their guard down too much in the weeks since he'd plopped down at _her_ table.

It started with Christine doing something stupid, that is, walking back to her room from the library in the dark. Alone. Regardless of whether you were male or female, Terran or not, walking around campus alone at night was just asking for trouble.

She was lucky that she made it back to her dorm unscathed. Unlucky in the fact that she ran into a solid male, making her heart jump to her throat and her pulse to yammer loud enough he was sure to hear it. He grabbed her arm and she flinched, and then calmed herself, standing straight up to look into his eyes, his ice-cold blue eyes that she could see in the light of the lamppost under which he'd caught her.

Their interaction was brief; his eyes traveled down her body quickly and thoroughly before giving her a mock salute and sending her on her way with a grin that didn't meet his eyes and a warning to hurry before someone else caught her. She'd scampered away without looking back and burst into her room startling Susan into lifting her head off the cock she was sucking to eye her speculatively.

"Get out," Susan said and Christine spun around to leave. "Not you, idiot. You." She shoved the guy onto the floor and his face went angrily red and he turned back to her with intent, but she shook a finger in his face. "Uh uh. I have a knife tucked in my bra. I wouldn't."

He slammed the door as he left and Susan rolled her eyes. "Engineers—they're all the same—all bark and no balls." She patted the bed next to her enticingly. "Now come over here and tell me what's got you all riled up."

*

The next morning, Christine carefully picked her way around the room, her movements sounding like a herd of elephants to her wine-soaked brain. She froze as Susan grunted and rolled over, punching the pillow with the knife under it into submission before dropping off again.

Christine would bet almost anything that Susan was holding that knife even as she slept and had been since Christine had grabbed the empty wine glass from her hand and she'd passed out.

So, Susan. Now that she hadn't expected at all. Last night, she had eaten up any and all information Christine had to give about her encounter with Jim Kirk and then had pulled Christine down into sitting next to her on the bed, telling her all sorts of details about just how she was making sex work to her advantage at the academy, from professors to lowly resident assistants (which made Christine want to gag, thinking of the bastard getting something willingly).

Her head was in a whir as she walked to the library, trying to decide whether she'd just been pumped for information or Susan had suddenly realized that Christine rubbed shoulders with some powerful people and aimed to make her happy. The former was definitely more likely. Christine didn't think there was any chance that her new association with McCoy gave her any more privileges, other than possibly having the pleasure of being ogled by his good buddy Jim Kirk.

Pulling open the old-fashioned library door, she saw the good buddy in her spot, encroaching on McCoy's space with a proprietary air that didn't appear to be anything new. McCoy was frowning, of course, but he wasn't leaning away.

Kirk spotted her first. "Christine! We were just talking about you." He wriggled his eyebrows at her as she slid warily into the chair across from them and set down the two coffees she was carrying. McCoy looked as if he'd swallowed something foul and wouldn't meet her eyes. Nice. Way to be subtle about your feelings, McCoy—way to look guilty.

Guilty about what?

She wanted to call him on it, but hadn't made up her mind about Kirk yet, so kept her mouth shut. "I thought my ears were burning," she said instead and took a sip of her double espresso. McCoy took a sip of his too and they sat there quiet for a minute, staring at the table until Kirk cleared his throat and they both looked at him.

"Well, this is nice. Do you meet here every day? How is that I haven't heard before this morning that you're in so tight with such a hot…nurse, McCoy?" Kirk did not wait for answers, but plowed ahead. "You see, Christine, there isn't much personal-wise that McCoy does without me, so imagine my surprise when I ran into you last night and, through undisclosed sources, found out that you're also the one spending quality time with my roommate."

He leaned forward and she struggled to control her urge to nervously play with the lid on her coffee, to avoid his gaze, to gather her shit and get the _hell_ out of there. She could hear the blaring sounds in her head telling her to stay the fuck away from people like Jim Kirk, that getting on their good side can sometimes turn out to be worse than being unnoticed. Once you're in the spotlight, it's a hell of time to leave it.

Somehow she doubted she could, especially when he smiled sweetly at her and said, "Tell me everything about you, Christine. I think we're going to be good friends."

The butterflies in her stomach that appeared when Kirk opened that stupidly arrogant mouth started rioting and she put a hand there to calm them. Blind luck and any of her encounters with James T. Kirk appeared to walk hand-in-hand and sing happy tunes in harmony, because at that moment, a warning bell sounded through the campus and she was saved, _saved_ from answering.

Later, on a ship hurtling through space captained by the notorious Pike and his fucking scary crew, Christine decided she'd just jumped from a gentle soothing bath into hot oil.

*

Survival during her first battle was marked by a series of images. First was ending up in sickbay three after the turbulent takeoff, McCoy nowhere in sight. She attempted to clean up the damage after the first hit, but ran into high-ranking officers while searching for more supplies on deck four. They barked at her to stop what she was doing and go to main sickbay _now_. Entering into more chaos, she found McCoy there doing what she had attempted: healing the wounded.

As ordered, they treated the most important first, working their way down in the ranks, regardless of the severity of their bleeding. Too many died before they could get to them, but every time she made an attempt to comfort a cadet rather than an officer, McCoy dragged her back with a death grip on her elbow.

She tried to feel grateful for his consideration, especially after one of the younger med techs made the mistake of handing bandages to patients out of order and received an agonizer to the neck for her efforts. While they all knew how it felt, it was different to see the weapon used for punishment instead of instruction.

Only later did she understand the implications of Vulcan's destruction and the quick response of the Imperial Fleet. In response to criticism that it showed weakness, they would state that only they could punish Vulcan, not some time-traveling Romulan with a personal grudge.

The dead were cleared out of sickbay before Kirk dragged in Pike with McCoy's help. As she had been able to avoid Pike for a few years, this was her first personal encounter with the captain. The rumored self-assurance and dangerous edge were still there, but he mainly looked tired.

Kirk, on the other hand, was bouncing on the balls of his feet and a smile was threatening to break out on his face. McCoy rolled his eyes at him and got to work.

*

Over three weeks later, Christine managed to regain a piece of her sanity and much-loved routine. Classes were canceled, the powers-that-be needing the time to argue over what happened and who was to blame and who gets to die.

Christine didn't care at this point. All she wanted was to sit at her table in the library with a cup of coffee and think.

She was practically throwing a hissy fit trying to program open the currently-locked library doors when he turned up. She really hadn't expected to see him.

"McCoy," she said flatly. She slumped to the ground in defeat—the door had won—and set the coffee on the step next to her. He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, clearing dreading the conversation, but knowing it had to be done. Christine took the plunge and asked the thing she knew he would know, what they weren't broadcasting to the public. "Pike?"

"Dead." His voice was devoid of emotion. She shuddered, remembering _The Enterprise_'s sickbay and the Empire's version of triage.

"Kirk?"

"Ecstatic."

Her coffee sloshed as she lifted it to her lips. The liquid burned all the way down, but she relished the feeling. "There's no going back now, is there?" She thought longingly of last month, of her belief that associating with McCoy was no big deal.

He didn't answer her, but it was a rhetorical question anyway. Instead, they sat quietly together and watched the gorgeous sunrise from the library steps, not really appreciating the sight. She snorted as she remembered something else.

"What?" he muttered, and snagged her coffee to take a sip.

"Susan." Her mood lightened at the memory of Susan meeting Chekov in the aftermath and the way their eyes had gleamed, almost identically, as they compared knives and then lifted shirts to compare scars. Match made in heaven. Or hell. She wasn't sure which.

But at least she had another ally in the mess that was to be their five-year mission under Captain Kirk. Even with the way McCoy leaned closer into her in the cool of the morning, Christine had a strong sense that she was going to need all the help she could get in the next few years.

That thought in mind, she chugged the now-cool liquid and stood up to toss the cup into the recycler. "Enough of this. Let's go." She walked away, not waiting to see if he followed.


End file.
